My bank told me my return was sent to green dot bank. How do I get my return?

[mesquitebean]

How does your bank know that?  Did your bank refuse a direct deposit from Green Dot Bank and sent it back?

Did you have any TurboTax fees that you chose to pay out of your Federal refund?   If so, we can tell you how to track your refund down and contact the intermediary company that handles that.   I can give you more info when you explain more.

[bambino-3]

It was supposed to be sent to my savings account but I forgot that I closed the savings account with my bank. So they rejected it. I had the deluxe edition so they took out the deluxe edition fee. That was it. My bank told me that it was sent the the green dot bank.

[mesquitebean]

OK.  Watch for my answer below that tells you how all that works when you choose to pay fees out of your refund, and what happens if your bank rejects it.

[bambino-3]

Okay thank you

[bambino-3]

Is the same for state or just federal?

[mesquitebean]

No, the state refund deposit is different.
The state refund is strictly between your state tax agency and your bank.   No intermediary bank is involved.  If your bank refuses the state refund deposit, it will go back to the state tax agency, who will issue you a check in the mail.

[mesquitebean]

It's probably a long shot, but if you wanted to, you could contact your state tax agency and see if they could cancel the direct deposit and mail you a check instead, but I don't know if that will be successful or not.    The IRS will do that if it's caught very early in the process, but I don't know about your state's policies since there are over 40 state tax agencies.

[mesquitebean · Accepted solution]

If you chose to pay your TurboTax fees out of your Federal refund, your funds will first go from the IRS to a temporary account at an intermediary bank--either Civista Bank of Sandusky, Ohio, or Green Dot Bank.  At the intermediary bank the fees are subtracted, then the rest of your funds are sent on to your bank (or prepaid debit card) in a second deposit.  The company that handles that is SBTPG (Santa Barbara Tax Products Group.)

Less commonly there can be delays at the intermediary bank, and additional ID info, etc. might be required.

If for any reason the second deposit fails (the one that is actually to your bank or card), it will bounce back to SBTPG's bank who will issue you a paper check in the mail.

Once the IRS has released your funds, you can log in to your temporary account at SBTPG to see the status of your funds.

To log in, choose the taxpayer portal at:
https://www.sbtpg.com/

SBTPG has a phone contact page at the following link. It also shows their business hours.  Even when they are closed, you may be able to get automated info, or you can log in as above.

https://help.sbtpg.com/hc/en-us/articles/230084587-Contact-Information

[carnleypat]

What is the number to Green Dot Bank? Sbtpg says they don't see anything.